Hillary Clinton calls for end to violence in Northern Ireland

Hillary Clinton has called for an end to violence in Northern Ireland amid a
revival of sectarian tensions in the region.

The US Secretary of State landed in Belfast as part of four-day European trip, just hours after police seized an unexploded bomb from suspected Republican dissidents. A second device was found in a postbox.

Mrs Clinton said: "People have strong feelings, but you must not use violence as a means of expressing those strong feelings.

"The only path forward is a peaceful democratic one. There can be no place in the new Northern Ireland for any violence.

"The remnants of the past need to be quickly, unequivocally condemned. Democracy requires dialogue, compromise and constant commitment by everyone to protect the rights of everyone."

Feelings have been running high since new restrictions were imposed on flying the Union flag over Belfast City Hall.

Limiting the number of days the flag can be shown has caused protests across the country. A loyalist mob set fire to offices of the centre-ground Alliance Party in Carrickfergus in County Antrim and the home of two councillors in Bangor was attacked.

The situation escalated as four men were arrested in Londonderry in connection with a viable bomb. Homes had to be evacuated as the army made the bomb – an improvised explosive device – safe.

Two men aged 47 and 49 were arrested at the scene at about 8.40pm. Two others, also in their 40s, were arrested later

A letter bomb was found in a postbox in Clough, Co Down, and defused by the Army.

A spokesman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland said they had received reports of a man acting suspiciously at a postbox at Dundrum Road at about 9pm last night.

Naomi Long, an Alliance MP, has been told to leave her home and not go to her office by PSNI who said there was a threat to her life. Ms Long, a former city councillor who won the seat at the last general election from Peter Robinson, said: "This will not prevent me providing a constituency service to the people who elected me."

The renewed hostilities come as Mrs Clinton is due to speak at Northern Ireland’s parliament, Stormont, and visit the new Titanic Centre later today.

She has visited Northern Ireland twice since becoming Secretary of State and held up the region as an example of somewhere that has overcome its troubles.

The Secretary of State met meet Peter Robinson, Northern Ireland’s first minister, in one of her last foreign trips as Washington’s most senior diplomat, before she steps down in the New Year.

Before she became part of the Obama adminstration, she was a repeated visitor to the country with her husband, former US President Bill Clinton, who was influential in the peace process.

The couple turned on the Christmas lights in Belfast in 1995 a year after the first IRA ceasefire.

The increasing tensions will be a blow to David Cameron after he agree to hold next year’s G8 summit near to the site of one of Northern Ireland’s worst bomb attacks.

The Prime Minister will welcome the leaders of the world's eight richest countries at the Lough Erne hotel and golf resort in Co Fermanagh in June.

It will take just five miles from the site of the Enniskillen bombing, which was one of the worst to hit Northern Ireland when it killed 12 people in 1987.

The summit will be the largest diplomatic event ever to be held in Northern Ireland. The Queen visited Enniskillen earlier this year during her two-day Diamond Jubilee tour and an historic meeting with Martin McGuinness.

Loyalists were today urged to cancel more planned street demonstrations in protest at the restrictions on flying the flag.

There were threats to hold another mass demonstration in Belfast city centre on Saturday, one of the busiest shopping days of the year, when many people could be at risk if violence breaks out, police said.

Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) assistant chief constable Will Kerr warned: "To encourage thousands of people to come to Belfast city centre on one of the busiest days of the year would be madness."

Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson called on protesters to suspend their action. He said: "My advice is that street protests should be suspended by those responsible for organising them in the wider interests of a peaceful society and to ensure their protests are not used by others to launch a campaign of violence," he said.

"Britishness will not be progressed by acts of violence. Anyone engaging in wanton violence or intimidation does not defend our national flag but disgraces it."